IPCC chief wannabe van Ypersele’s communication record

As Australia’s Tony Thomas had noted last October, Jean-Pascal van Ypersele an IPCC vice-chair of the modelling persuasion, threw his hat in the ring to succeed the more recently disgraced Rajendra Pachauri.

Donna Laframboise reported today that the U.K. Guardian, dedicated and dutiful propagator of all messages green, kindly gave van Ypersele a platform from which he launched his vision for the future of this (IMHO) increasingly irrelevant body.

I thought it was interesting to note that van Ypersele seems to take great pride in his past accomplishments. For example, he wrote:

For the IPCC to be relevant, it must also continue to improve its communication with policymakers and with the public. This is an area I am proud to have contributed to as Vice-chair in charge of designing the implementation plan for the IPCC Communication strategy. [emphasis added-hro]

YMMV, but the only significant “improvement” in the IPCC “Communication strategy” that I’ve noticed is the more timely release of IPCC generated reports. Something that probably should (and could) have transpired at least five or ten years ago. Not to mention that in his less disgraced (2009) days as a Merchant in Venice Pachauri had declared:

[T]he IPCC AR5 is being taken in hand at a time when awareness on climate change issues has reached a level unanticipated in the past. Much of this change can be attributed to the findings of the AR4 which have been disseminated actively through a conscious effort by the IPCC, its partners and most importantly the media. Expectations are, therefore, at an all time high as far as the AR5 is concerned.

Where was van Ypersele’s voice on the IPCC’s “Communication” strategy back in those halcyon days, I wonder?! Or are we to believe that it is simply the case that for van Ypersele, at least, silence does not equal acquiescence?!

As for van Ypersele on the “improv[ing] communication … with the public” front, my own recent experience suggests to me that he is not inclined to practice what he preaches:

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele demonstrates his idea of “communicating” with the public

Sounds of silence. Quelle surprise, eh?! By comparison, however, he was extraordinarily vocal in 2009 when he bestowed upon the world his (pre-emptive?!) “assessment” of Climategate. As I had noted and quoted, a few years ago:

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, a vice-chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said that the theft from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU) was not the work of amateur climate sceptics, but was a sophisticated and well-funded attempt to destroy public confidence in the science of man-made climate change. He said the fact that the e-mails were first uploaded to a sceptic website from a computer in Russia was an indication that the culprit was paid.

Then again, perhaps such off-the-wall fantasies are to be expected from one whose writing history indicates that he sees no harm whatsoever in publishing his speculations and bent via Greenpeace … which he indisputably did in 2004 (as documented by Russell Cook in 2011). Not unlike fellow IPCC-nik, Andrew Weaver, van Ypersele seems to be one of those “free speech for me, but not for thee” kind of guys:

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, a Vice-Chair (Vice President) of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, objected to Fred Singer participating in a seminar on global warming / climate change that was to be held at SEII Foundation Universitaire in Brussels.

[Cook goes on to note:]

You’d think he would want to minimize any ties with enviro-activist groups at that point, but then we read in this Greenpeace paper, “Report commissioned by Greenpeace and written by Jean-Pascal van Ypersele and Philippe Marbaix, Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium. July 2004.

On the 2nd page […] IPCC Lead Author Jean-Pascal van Ypersele’s Greenpeace-commissioned paper starts with a fictional account of an out-of-control global warming disaster 40 years into the future, […]

“The Strategy also requires people speaking on behalf of the IPCC to focus on factual, objective presentation of information from the approved reports and refrain from public statements that could be interpreted as advocacy and compromise the IPCC’s reputation for neutrality. The Strategy indicates that this is particularly important for those holding the most senior positions.”

“Slam the brakes”?! Sounds like he’s been taking public speaking lessons from Andrew <barrage of intergalactic ballistic missiles> Weaver!

The list of IPCC bigshots (van Ypersele, Pachauri, Stocker, Field, Jarraud, Weaver … to name but a few) whose utterances strongly suggest that they seem to be missing the point of this “Strategy” requirement, seems to get longer by the day!

Mind you, considering past performances, perhaps one should not completely rule out the possibility that they’ve … uh … redefined words such as “factual”, “objective” and/or “advocacy”. But no one’s told the rest of us about these changes, yet ;-)

Pleased as punch that you referred to my old 2011 American Thinker article. The link in it to van Ypersele’s paper goes to a now non-functioning Google docs version of it, but Greenpeace itself is still apparently dumb enough to keep a copy online: http://www.greenpeace.org/belgium/PageFiles/19049/SumIB_uk.pdf